Roseburg review. [volume] (Roseburg, Or.) 1885-1920, 1887-07-22
THE BEAUTIFUL WEST INDIES.

A Hea1thfu1 Climate and Magnificent
Scenery-plain and Cordillera.
Those islands are as distinct in features
as III origin. Some are suggestive of a
period when a large portion of our con-
tinent was submerged in the ocean.
Others are towering masses of trap rock,
with cone like SUBMITS, declaring their
volcanic descent. Others for ages have
been in a progressive state-the work OF
the invisible zophite architect. Some
have not yet risen above the belt of foam
that marks their existence as coral reefs,
and notifies the mariners of danger.
while others soar above the tides and
bloom with evidences of bounteous har-
vests. Seryile instructions, attended
with great loss of property and life, have,
in years past, retarded the prosperity of
those islands Shocks of earthquake
there hive alarmed the inhabitants, and
the serenity of the heavens is often dis
turbed by the desolating track of the
hurricane. Large conhagrations have
occurred there, as in TIE United States,
but energy has sllrmolnted those losses
by fire, and better built houses have
arisen from the ruins.
From December to Nav the climate is
delightful and healthy, even along the
coast, where, in the summer months,
yellow fever occasionally occurs. The
mountainous regions or cordilleras, where
the wealthy planters have their elegant
residences, are blessed with perennial
springtime and exempted from epidemic
influences. The mean temperature of
these highlands is about 20 Fahrenheit,
OF fl,o n1a 1f
you are securely fortified against the
attacks of yellow jack. Beauty
and sublimity i'll pre-eminent de-
gree are combined in the scenery of those
cordilleras, especially in the blue noun
tains of jamaica. the largest and most
valuable island of the British West In
dies. The loftiest peak of that ridge,
which extends some fifty leagues in
length, is nearly 5000 feet high, although
the mean elevation does not exceed one
third of that measurement. The crest of
the chain is so sharp that in many places
it is only four yards across; the escarp-
ments are wild, the declivities steep,
checkered in places with stately forest
growth. The more elevated ranges are
thanked by still lower ones, and these BY
verdant savannahs.
A belt of intervening plain lies between
the ocean and the blue cordillera and is
frightened with tracks of guinea grass,
corn, sugar cane and groves of cocoa and
plantain proudly tossing their palnated
heads in unison with the rIIstling airs.
There are also seen the tapering furnaces
of the sugar works, the overseer's dwell
ing and clusters of the laborers' huts.
But those evidences of culture and popu-
lation are not confined to the plain. Look
up the steep, rugged side of the cortlillera
and you viii see where its precipitollsness
| does not render cultivation impossible.
The dark tint of the woodland that gives
name to the mountain chain is diversi-
fled with the light green of cultivated
| fields and golden shades of ripening cere-
ais. You viii see abrupt cliffs dotted
with white specks as points Of rock, or
| perchance reminding you of an eagIc.s :
aerie. When with a telescope these points
| are brought closer to your vision, you be-
hold one white speck transformed into a
lovely country seat, others into. hanlets
nesting ON the brows of precipices 5000
feet or more in height. Bride paths
scarcely twelve feet wide are cut up tho
sides of this cordillera to its gorges and
| table lands. for journeys in the interior
are generally made on horseback, as the
asperities of the country are unfavorable
to the transit of carriages. Baltimore
| American.